Quilting done!

 I just finished the quilting and trimmed the red cross quilt.

Right when I thought I was done, I had to go back in and do a little more...  

I figured it was worth it at this point not to rush it, and do it all just right...

I'm not sure Why I quilted a quilt like this.. It just sort of happened...

And let me tell you, I learned a lot by doing this quilt...

 Go slow.  Free motion does not mean got 100 mph...

As you gain confidence you find you can speed up a bit, but over all, taking your time is key.

 I learned, I HATE stippling, aka, Random meandering... 

Why?  Although it looks good to quilt down areas,

it take north east, south, and west direction when your quilting... 

So your pushing, pulling and moving the quilt in every direction and is the hardest on your shoulders.... 

Feathers, are often a forward backward movement, which is much easier.. 

and also the three half shell stitch, which looks even better than a meander, 

is also easier, forward and backward....

 Feathers are intimidating? Very much so. So, wanna know what I did?

I took a sketchbook, and I filled ever page with feathers.... every kind of feathers... straight line feathers, curved feathers, feathers around a shape... and filled every inch of the sketch book...

Once you have the motion and the direction that you are sure of when attempting your feathers, they become very easy...  You can cover a lot of ground doing feathers very quickly.

On this quilt, I basically used 4 different stitches... feathers first... 

then meander, then the half shell thingy, and the curves inside the boxes of the crosses...

(these stitches are in the first top left photograph.)

For the scallop swags around the border, I traced the curve for the swags, then just went for it ...

I added things as I went along like plumes at the swag points. Extra lines if the swags were to puffy... etc...

Now I am going to prepare my bias binding... Haven't ever done that before either!  But I have been told that it will stay laying much flatter after it's laundered, if I use bias binding... 

Hey, it's a learning curve,

and it's time to learn something else new!

It's by far, not a perfect quilt... Patience, was key...  

And think how fab it will look after it's laundered!  

You wont' see all the little oopsie stitches!

I'm so OK with that!  There are always more quilt to do something a little better on next time!

I'm not into perfect quilts anyway...  

I accidentally stitched out a sway scallop... I think I may leave it.

;-)

My Christmas gift to myself! (nearly complete!)

ooh!  extra!
SEE PAGE 7 at
http://www.thepiedaterre.com/